Monday, January 21, 2013

Friday, January 18, 2013

So my Stage one conversion is complete! I just added this new air cleaner made by Arlen Ness. It's called the 'Big Sucker" and I know why, when you fire up the bike it is audible in its 'sucking' sound.

It seems to have also increased the overall volume of the bike and the fact that is essentially an open air intake straight to the engine allows air to just suck freely through it and straight out the back of my un-muffled drag pipes. This makes Purple Rain Thunder like a Milwaukee rainstorm! They say Loud pipes, save lives and hopefully these will keep me alive longer, and make cagers see me when I am on the road!

It has increased performance by a noticeable margin and I think it looks way nicer then the stock sportster air cleaner. Overall I am diggin my new found Horse Power and loving the new look of my baby.

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Hope everyone's week is going well and all that good stuff. What I wanted to talk about today is the Dark Angels Codex. I think it is a very nice and high quality book. The thing I am amazed by is the fact that this $50 dollar book is a very nice piece of bookery but it isn't a great rules book.

Nice new art

Not that the rules themselves are bad, its not that, in fact I think the army has gotten a nice boost and are in-line with other armies in this edition. The rules are, however, clumsy and filled with typos... Not what you want in a 'rules' book. At first I didn't notice them and then I started reading online and thought: "it cant be that bad" but what I now realize after GW dropped their FAQ that the book is riddled with mistakes. lots of small omissions and things that could screw you if you looked i the wrong place, or didn't check the FAQ.

Whoa! Fiction in the filler pages, what is this 3rd ed?!?

You don't have to believe me, just go to GW website (here) and see how sloppy their editors did on what is basically should be a luxury item. I am not all nerd ragey or anything I just feel like if GW is going to present themselves as the premiere game of gaming with toy army men then they need to take some time and get these books airtight before publishing and putting a $50 sticker on them. When I say airtight I don't even mean from a playtest perspective, because that train left the station awhile ago and might never come back, but just in the grammar and basic editing. With the wonders of computers and cut and paste technology the stat lines and wargear lists on one page should sure as hell match the stats on another page, and in this book sadly they don't.

Whats the solution?
Well apparently I now need to stick some crusty black and white pdf' into my new 'beautiful' book in order for it to be consistent and have the proper rules. This onveneintly adds three places for me to have to look up a rule... I know gw is making the digital codexs available. and updating those, but I already bought the hardback because I am a bibliophile, but this is not just a book (on the book level this book is a good one!) it is a rules-book and should have the rules, whether good or bad, be consistent and line up throughout the book. The half-assery and shabby nature of the rules differences from one part of the book to another is somewhat pathetic for any game company, much less the bestesettsest of the best as GW fancies itself.

Overall I really have been enjoying looking over the Codex and enjoying the nice art and even the fluff is slightly better written then previous incarnations but it is not a sound rules book for the above mentioned things. If GW continues to put out sub-par books thinking they can just update them later I am bit disappointed.

One of my all time favorites... Now in colour!

Honestly, I am diggin the book, but this rules typo situation is a bit sub-par and not worthy of a $50 book... Now I am about to order the Horus Heresy Book from Forge Word and I am curious to see how far they outclass GW proper. More on that front in a future article, but until then take 'er easy Buddys!

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

As I have told you I got this sweet, sweet machine in the begining of the fall and thought I would share it's transformation with everyone as I build her to be the bike I have always wanted.

This is my good Friend, the Rupakaya, helping me pull the old tailpipes off

So getting her up to Stage 1 was an important step. What that means is getting more air flowing out the back and more air sucking into the engine as well. By increasing the airflow through the engine, the horsepower is increased. This takes two steps, one is new pipes and/or baffles, and a new air cleaner. So I decided to go with some Paughco drag pipes, with the gooseneck at the ends. These bad boys are un-muffled and pretty loud.

Here she is without the pipes on her

In addition to taking the old pipes off and replacing them with the drag pipes I also decided to go for the fiberglass tape wrap over the pipes as well. This serves two functions of keeping myelf from burning my leg or my passenger's leg while riding as well increasing the heat inside the pipes which pulls more air through the engine (also increasing the horsepower).

Here she is next to her friends and sporting her newly wrapped Drag Pipes

So there she is, and I have also just recently replaced the air cleaner and that will be my next post about the bike, so stay tuned. To see what she looks like with the full Stage 1 treatment...

A little front shot so you can see how it looks

Let me know if the bike s an interesting thing for anyone, I love it and am happy to share all of my hobbies here on the Buddy Times, especially if it is interesting to people. Till next time, Cheers

Saturday, January 5, 2013

so just a quick post o share with you the vids that GW posted in regards to the new Dark Angels stuff.

Firstly, the DeathWing:

Then the RavenWing and the new vehicles:

Overall I am liking most everything seen so far, with the exception of the weird Land Speeder thingy. I know it's functioning on some type of anti-grav technology but it just looks too bulky for its dinky little wing thingys... That's even by Land Speeder standards and they already have dinky little wings, but it is what it is.

Good to see this guy back

The other loser in this equation IMHO is Belial. Maybe he will look better in person but it seems like you could make a much tougher looking Belial just from the new DW kit but I will have to see him in person to make the final call on it.

Pretty Sweet new artwork

So far this release has actually gotten me a bit excited about 40k for the first time since the launch of 6ed. I am hoping that the excitement continues and I can actually get some hobby traction going on expanding my DA army and maybe even making them an army capable of winning without just running TH/SS termies by the dozens (which myself have never done but it was something that was pretty tough for a minute after the big FAQ came out awhile back).

Hope everyone has a great weekend, and enjoy your new White Dwarfs and lets hope GW can bring out a good dex with some fun options that is not too OTT.Cheers

Thursday, January 3, 2013

So firstly happy new year! Hope this year kicks last year's @ss because 2012 was a harsh mistress to yours truly...

Now that that's outta the way we can look at what I have been thinking and doing, clearly keeping the blog updated has not been one of them. Well for starters my hobby has almost completely fallen by the wayside, but I have been feeling that mid-winter's itch to start-up again, and oh what do ya know a new Dark Angels Codex is right around the corner. That is good because the Chaos Dex and new models did not really make me that excited and in fact I was so underwhelmed by the dino-bots that I completely abstained from any purchases in regards to the new Chaos stuff.

Unfortunately the 3.5 Chaos Dex basically ruined me from liking anything to come out for Chaos in nearly a decade, but since my DA army has never been a good performer and my main draw is the models and the DeathWing, this new book looks like just what the doctor ordered for me. I mean now I can run extra cool DW termies with my regular termies!

Also on a another note, this ^^^ right here has been my current hobby. This is my brand-new-second-hand bike, its 1200 cc Sportster by Harley Davidson. I have been ridin almost every day since I got her and loving my machine... like mechanicum level love for this machine. So in addition to my 40k content I am hoping to add some bike stuff as well as other non-hobby stuff like more movie and show reviews/previews t the blog content for all to enjoy (hopefully).

On that note here's an awesome looking trailer for all you buddys out there:

Lets hope this new year brings good things for all and I will see you guys on the flipside!Cheers!